New Avon Body Company

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Avon Motor Body Company
New Avon Body Company
Avon Motor Bodies
legal form Limited Company
founding 1919
resolution 1973
Reason for dissolution takeover
Seat Warwick , UK
Branch Body shop

The New Avon Body Company was a British manufacturer of automobile bodies , which at times also operated as the Avon Motor Body Company or Avon Motor Bodies . In the interwar period, the company was best known for its special bodies for the Standard Motor Company chassis . There was a temporary connection to Richard and Alan Jensen, whose first body designs from the time before Jensen Motors were founded at New Avon. After some restructuring, Avon survived as a repair shop until the 1970s. The Avon name was later revived by independent companies.

Company history

Lea-Francis 12 HP (1929)
Avon Standard Swan Coupe (1930)
Avon Standard Tourer (1935)
Standard 16 Pillarless Saloon (1936)

The operation was in 1919 as Avon Motor Body Company based in Warwick ( Warwickshire established); the founders were called Tilt and Philipps. The company's name refers to the Avon River on the banks of which the city lies. After restructuring and a change of ownership, the company renamed the New Avon Body Company in 1922. The company became known nationwide under this name.

Lea-Francis

From 1919 to 1927, New Avon worked primarily for Lea-Francis , and to a lesser extent for Hampton . In 1927 Lea-Francis got into economic difficulties, as a result of which the New Avons bills could no longer be paid. Instead, Lea-Francis left finished cars to the bodybuilder to settle the claims. The business relationship between New Avon and Lea-Francis then gradually ran out until 1930.

Influence of the Jensen brothers

At the end of the 1920s, New Avons joined forces with Richard and Alan Jensen, who a few years later would set up their own body shop, Jensen Motors. The Jensen brothers had designed a special body for the chassis of an Austin Seven and a little later constructed a similarly designed body for a standard nine chassis. The design was approved by the standard management, so the Jensen brothers planned a series production. In the absence of their own workshops, they turned to the New Avon Body Company through the mediation of a journalist, which had free capacities in view of the decline in orders from Lea-Francis. The car designed by Alan Jensen was sold as the Avon-Standard Swan Coupe from 1929 . At that time, Alan Jensen joined the company and was responsible for designing the New Avon bodies for a year or two. The Swan Coupé was followed by similarly designed limousines without a center post ( Wayfarer Pillarless Saloon ) and convertibles, whose designs were also based on Alan Jensen. Comparable bodies were also offered for the Wolseley Hornet from 1931 .

New Avon and Standard

The Jensen designs realized by New Avon were special models that were offered in parallel to the regular factory vehicles manufactured by Pressed Steel and Fisher and Ludlow . They sell well. The Standard Motor Company signed a ten-year contract with the company for the supply of chassis. He ensured New Avon's survival in the early 1930s. Based on designs by Charles Frederick Beauvais , who took over the role of Head of Design from Alan Jensen in 1931, attractive coupés, roadsters and four-door sedans with and without center posts were created in the first half of the 1930s, and New Avon became a “pioneer for special bodies Middle class chassis ”. Beauvais' designs were regarded as "highly independent designs with flowing lines". Some contemporary observers saw them as equivalent to the Swallow "SS" superstructures . However, New Avon did not succeed in designing similarly low bodies as Swallow, because the company relied on regular standard chassis, while Swallow received special, lowered chassis. In addition to the special bodies for Standard, the production of which was the main focus at this time, New Avon also continued to produce small numbers of bodies for Wolseley and Lanchester . In 1937, New Avon, whose financial situation was "repeatedly chaotic", became insolvent. The company was no longer able to pay for the standard chassis, and Standard immediately stopped delivering. New Avon was dissolved after a bankruptcy.

Maudslay Group

In 1938 the Maudslay Group, which also included the Standard Motor Company, took over the material from New Avon. A new company was set up under the name Avon Motor Bodies. The company initially had the task of bringing the bodies that New Avon had produced in stock before the bankruptcy on the market. Most of them have been converted to fit on the chassis of the Triumph Dolomite . This relationship ended with Triumph's bankruptcy in 1939. In addition, new superstructures were built for the Lea-Francis Company, which had returned to automobile production under new management. The design of these bodies was created by Arthur Meredith, who had taken the place of Charles Beauvais. Shortly before the outbreak of World War II , Avon began manufacturing commercial vehicle bodies. Avon mainly repaired aircraft components during the war. After the end of the war there were attempts to resume the production of special bodies, but only a few convertible bodies were made for the Hillman Minx . In the absence of further orders, Avon shifted its focus to body repairs for the next 20 years; In addition, a few series automobiles were built into funeral vehicles.

Ladbroke-Avon

In 1973 Graham Hudson took over the company, which had its own body shop and subsequently linked the two companies. The existence of Avon thus ended for the time being.

From 1978 the name Avon reappeared in the automotive sector, but there were no direct references to the traditional body manufacturer. Graham Hudson founded Ladbroke-Avon in 1978, which also included the newly established Avon Special Products division. Avon Special Products specialized in Land Rover and Range Rover conversions and also manufactured twelve convertibles based on the Jaguar XJ-C . In 1980 Ladbroke-Avon constructed a station wagon version of the Jaguar XJ Series III , which was produced in small numbers from 1981. In 1983 Ladbroke-Avon presented a stylistically revised and high-quality version of the Triumph Acclaim with the intention of opening up a larger customer base . Marketed as the Avon Acclaim, the car featured two-tone paintwork, a vinyl roof, and a chrome grille. In the interior there were seats upholstered in Conolly leather and real wood inlays in the dashboard. From 1983 a turbo engine developed by Ladbroke-Avon was available. The cars were available through selected Leyland dealers; the renovation cost was £ 2990. The demand remained far below expectations; only "a handful of copies" were sold. In addition, Ladbroke-Avon produced some Talbot Sunbeam Lotus with modified interiors and independent paintwork on behalf of Talbot in 1983 . Instead of the planned 150 vehicles, only 65 cars were built.

literature

  • Graham Robson: The Book of the Standard Motor Company , Veloce Publishing Ltd, 2011, ISBN 9781845843434 ,
  • Nick Walker: A – Z of British Coachbuilders 1919–1960 . Shebbear 2007 (Herridge & Sons Ltd.) ISBN 978-0-9549981-6-5 .

Web links

Commons : New Avon  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual proof

  1. ^ Graham Robson: The Book of the Standard Motor Company , Veloce Publishing Ltd, 2011, ISBN 9781845843434 , p. 42.
  2. ↑ John Tipler: Jensen Interceptor. The Complete Story . Crowood Press Ltd., Ramsbury 2004. ISBN 978-1-86126-711-5 , p. 14.
  3. ^ Graham Robson: The Book of the Standard Motor Company , Veloce Publishing Ltd, 2011, ISBN 9781845843434 , p. 58.
  4. ↑ Nick Walker: A – Z of British Coachbuilders 1919–1960 , Shebbear 2007 (Herridge & Sons Ltd.) ISBN 978-0-9549981-6-5 , p. 151.
  5. ^ NN: A Survey of Coachwork . Motorsport Magazine, November 1934, p. 47 ("Pioneer in the field of building special bodies on medium-powered chassis")
  6. Jump up ↑ Barry Down: Art Deco and British Car Design: The Airline Cars of the 1930s , Veloce Publishing Ltd, 2010, ISBN 9781845842529 , p. 95.
  7. ^ A b c Nick Walker: A – Z of British Coachbuilders 1919–1960 , Shebbear 2007 (Herridge & Sons Ltd.) ISBN 978-0-9549981-6-5 , p. 152.
  8. ^ A b Graham Robson: The Book of the Standard Motor Company , Veloce Publishing Ltd, 2011, ISBN 9781845843434 , p. 43.
  9. ↑ a b Mark Dollery: Jensen V8: The Complete Story of the American-Powered Cars , Crowood Press 2016, ISBN 9781785001239 .
  10. ↑ Company history on the website www.xjconvertible.com (accessed on February 14, 2019).
  11. ↑ Auto Catalog No. 25 (1981/82), p. 89.
  12. ^ History of the Avon Acclaim on www.aronline.co.uk (accessed February 13, 2019).
  13. ↑ Avon Coachworks on the website www.carsceneinternational.com (accessed February 13, 2019).
  14. ^ Auto Catalog No. 27 (1983/84), p. 78.